It started off awful to begin with because I wound up on two weeks of (terrible) jury duty on a mentally draining trial. So I didn't have as much time to prepare as I thought I would -- though, honestly, the prep I did do was fine. But I was going into it stressed. I didn't even book hotel or train tickets until the day before because I wasn't sure if I'd have to be back for another day of jury duty or not on Monday (and my sessions were on Sunday until late and it was far enough away that even if I could catch a train back, it would get me home after 1 am).
Anyway, I went Saturday afternoon so I wouldn't have to run on Sunday and maybe have a chance to decompress a bit and enjoy what I'd been told was a charming town. The hotel was nice, but super expensive on the Saturday night (which I didn't expect them to cover)--double what it was for Sunday night's stay. Walking around it was...well, it was like any random English town that isn't London. Some nice old buildings. Random construction. There were a lot of busy restaurants and bars and I managed to find a place for dinner that got good reviews. It was...okay. The clientele was varied. A few tables of ladies my age or older, dressed to kill and adjusting their boobs (one woman literally couldn't apparently keep her hands off of them, though I'm not sure what she thought the constant pushing up and cupping was going to do...gravity is gravity, ma'am.) Older men, balding, with younger ladies in very short skirts. Reminded me of White Lotus. A few hen-do's, one of which the bride-to-be was so pregnant that I was thinking the wedding better be the next day or she'd not likely make it--she barricaded herself in the toilet and wouldn't let anyone else in for a while.
So. Yeah. I wasn't overly impressed by the town. I really have pretty much figured out that I like London, but I don't love the rest of England. At least, not to live in. Haven't tried Manchester, so maybe it's okay. I mean, it had better restaurants than Coventry but that's not a steep hill to climb.
Before I even arrived, I'd received a notice late on Friday (too late to do anything about it) that the Waterstones that was supposed to have ordered books for all the visiting authors had somehow messed up my part of the order so that none of my books were available to sell/sign.
This is not even the first time this has happened to me at an event. Maybe the third. Everyone else's somehow always wind up ordered, but not mine. Do I have a curse?
And they were charging £5 to £10 less for my 2 hour workshop than some other people's sessions (who weren't any "bigger" than I am and were sometimes only 1 hour things). It just felt kind of insulting.
And, at various times, my name was misspelled -- both first and surname, though not at the same time. The first name gets misspelled all the time in this country, to be fair, but it's still annoying and makes you feel unseen and unappreciated.
The sessions themselves were okay, though not packed with people, and I did well at them. Honestly, I'm really good at it. I had attendees ask me when/where they could hear me speak again, others that stayed late, a few that came to my panel session to hear me speak more.
But, all told, I make very very little money off of these things, especially when they don't even have my books available for sale. They are exhausting, even if I am good at the talking part. From a purely cost-benefit analysis, they aren't worth it. I did help a handful of writers with the workshop, but I could probably start running an online course and keep a discord and reach more people if I wanted to do that.
So, yeah. Maybe it's sour grapes but it never feels like these things work out in my favour.
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